As shown in Scheme 1, muconic acid (“MA”) is an unsaturated dicarboxylic acid, hexe-2,4-dienedoic acid, which can exist in three isomeric forms.

Techniques that isomerize cis,trans-muconic acid to trans,trans-muconic acid typically involve chemicals such as iodine and organic solvents or expensive noble metal catalysts (e.g., Pd/C), and require additional steps of separation and purification after isomerization to isolate the desired isomer.